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Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization
Women and the Making of the Mongol Empire
How did women contribute to the rise of the Mongol Empire while Mongol men were conquering Eurasia? This book positions women in their rightful place in the otherwise well-known story of Chinggis Khan (commonly known as Genghis Khan) and his conquests and empire. Examining the best known women of Mongol society, such as Chinggis Khan's mother, Hö'elün, and senior wife, Börte, as well as those who were less famous but equally influential, including his daughters and his conquered wives, we see the systematic and essential participation of women in empire, politics and war. Anne F. Broadbridge also proposes a new vision of Chinggis Khan's well-known atomized army by situating his daughters and their husbands at the heart of his army reforms, looks at women's key roles in Mongol politics and succession, and charts the ways the descendants of Chinggis Khan's daughters dominated the Khanates that emerged after the breakup of the Empire in the 1260s.
370 pages, Paperback
Published September 6, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
September 26, 2018
I reviewed this for the Asian Review of Books:
http://asianreviewofbooks.com/content...
http://asianreviewofbooks.com/content...
August 30, 2021
An excellent, much-needed look at the role of women within the Mongol Empire and the successor khanates. Broadbridge juggles an impressive number of sources to bring together the overlooked stories of royal women and consort lineages, and sets the stage for further scholarship on this important topic.
In June 0f 2000, I was a Peace Corps volunteer newly arrived in Mongolia, touring the Mongolian National Museum of History. One of the exhibits mentioned a daughter of Chinggis Khaan; I asked our language teacher for her name and more information about her. He shrugged. "No one knows," he said, "The daughters weren't as important. No one kept track of them."
Twenty years later, Broadbridge proves that someone, at least, actually does know and is keeping track, and the story is far more complex than simple family and reproductive drama. Even a brief glance at Mongol history and tradition makes it clear that women played a significant role in the politics, economics, diplomacy, and artistic and religious lives of the Mongol khanates. A closer look strongly suggests that they also played a substantial role in the military successes of the empire during its expansionist surge under Chinggis Khaan and his sons and grandsons. But articulating how and why - particularly to Western, male historians who are skeptical of any claims that smack of feminist revisionist history, and even more so when they revolve around the purportedly masculine topics of "Genghis Khan" and military history - can be difficult because the sources are so obscure.
Broadbridge documents several systems that operated to keep women central to Mongol political life. Most importantly, probably, is the role that elite women played as administrators of the ordos, or the camps of the khans - a position which meant that these high-status women were essentially overseeing all non-military aspects of the Mongol court. By necessity, this meant that they were very much a part of public and political life. This reliance on female administration also allowed Chinggis Khaan to marry his daughters into rival states, co-opt his new sons-in-law and their armies into his military projects, and leave the princesses in charge of running those states - in Chinggisid interests, of course. Although the Mongols are not typically seen as culturally hegemonic, one wonders how this vesting of authority in Chinggisid princesses played out.
Levirate marriages, in which a widow married her dead husband's brother, son (by another wife), or, in some cases, grandson, served to keep important women in positions of authority over court affairs, allowing stability amidst succession upheavals (indeed, the longevity of some of these women's careers make their far more well-known husbands seem positively ephemeral in comparison). And the preference for exchange marriages with maternal cousins, in which royal daughters were married to their mother's nephews and royal sons to their mother's nieces, provided another form of stability in power relations among elite families, enshrining a limited number of lineages as consort houses across the empire and the later khanates. (There was SO MUCH maternal-cousin-marriage in these lineages that it was a bit disconcerting. I had no idea that this happened so extensively until I read this book and nearly went cross-eyed trying to track all the interwoven family trees.) Mongolian kinship is firmly patrilineal, but this privileging of maternal kin marriages elevated women's families and kept the women concerned in positions of influence, especially since their brothers often came along with the marriage as military commanders for the khan (and potential matches for princesses).
Elite women also had a voice and vote in the huriltais that chose successor khans - especially if they were descended from Chinggis Khaan's chief wife Borte, and/or if their sons were contenders for the throne. This played out to the woe of the empire in the cases of Toregene and Sorqaqtani, probably the most infamous Mongol women, whose respective successful attempts to raise sons to the status of Grand Khaan ultimately dismembered the empire. But Broadbridge places those stories within the wider framework of the queens' role as the high-status women of conquered peoples, co-opted into marriage with Chinggisid princes, rather than relying on tropes of scheming women or the biased accounts of historians working for rival houses in later decades of Mongol rule.
This book is firmly feminist in its attempt to restore women to their rightful and very central role in Mongol history, but it's not a girl-power book. In her consideration of the lives of Mongol women, elite and non-elite alike, Broadbridge is clear-eyed about the harsh realities that they faced, whether as victims of war, kidnapped or captive wives, or queens who were executed for overplaying their hands (a surprising number of high-status women ended up wrapped in felt and tossed in rivers). Nevertheless, she shows us a set of systems that were distinctly different from those that prevailed in Europe at the time, and suggests the ways in which these systems regularly allowed women to wield enormous power. As she states at the end of the book, the topic of women in the Mongol Empire is a field that is in its infancy, but this book certainly provides a robust foundation for future work.
(Note that it took me over a year to finish this book only because I accidentally left it behind during what was supposed to be a short trip that the pandemic turned into a 9-month-long sojourn. The length of time doesn't reflect anything about the book; it's quite engaging.)
Addendum: On the basis of the fact that I shelved this book, Goodreads' algorithm recommended to me the following:
, which is blurbed as "...a brand new series about...wild and sexy firefighters..."
I really look forward to a forthcoming book about the political role of sexy firefighters of the 13th century steppe. Meanwhile, though, thanks for the laugh, Goodreads. Sort out your algorithm.
In June 0f 2000, I was a Peace Corps volunteer newly arrived in Mongolia, touring the Mongolian National Museum of History. One of the exhibits mentioned a daughter of Chinggis Khaan; I asked our language teacher for her name and more information about her. He shrugged. "No one knows," he said, "The daughters weren't as important. No one kept track of them."
Twenty years later, Broadbridge proves that someone, at least, actually does know and is keeping track, and the story is far more complex than simple family and reproductive drama. Even a brief glance at Mongol history and tradition makes it clear that women played a significant role in the politics, economics, diplomacy, and artistic and religious lives of the Mongol khanates. A closer look strongly suggests that they also played a substantial role in the military successes of the empire during its expansionist surge under Chinggis Khaan and his sons and grandsons. But articulating how and why - particularly to Western, male historians who are skeptical of any claims that smack of feminist revisionist history, and even more so when they revolve around the purportedly masculine topics of "Genghis Khan" and military history - can be difficult because the sources are so obscure.
Broadbridge documents several systems that operated to keep women central to Mongol political life. Most importantly, probably, is the role that elite women played as administrators of the ordos, or the camps of the khans - a position which meant that these high-status women were essentially overseeing all non-military aspects of the Mongol court. By necessity, this meant that they were very much a part of public and political life. This reliance on female administration also allowed Chinggis Khaan to marry his daughters into rival states, co-opt his new sons-in-law and their armies into his military projects, and leave the princesses in charge of running those states - in Chinggisid interests, of course. Although the Mongols are not typically seen as culturally hegemonic, one wonders how this vesting of authority in Chinggisid princesses played out.
Levirate marriages, in which a widow married her dead husband's brother, son (by another wife), or, in some cases, grandson, served to keep important women in positions of authority over court affairs, allowing stability amidst succession upheavals (indeed, the longevity of some of these women's careers make their far more well-known husbands seem positively ephemeral in comparison). And the preference for exchange marriages with maternal cousins, in which royal daughters were married to their mother's nephews and royal sons to their mother's nieces, provided another form of stability in power relations among elite families, enshrining a limited number of lineages as consort houses across the empire and the later khanates. (There was SO MUCH maternal-cousin-marriage in these lineages that it was a bit disconcerting. I had no idea that this happened so extensively until I read this book and nearly went cross-eyed trying to track all the interwoven family trees.) Mongolian kinship is firmly patrilineal, but this privileging of maternal kin marriages elevated women's families and kept the women concerned in positions of influence, especially since their brothers often came along with the marriage as military commanders for the khan (and potential matches for princesses).
Elite women also had a voice and vote in the huriltais that chose successor khans - especially if they were descended from Chinggis Khaan's chief wife Borte, and/or if their sons were contenders for the throne. This played out to the woe of the empire in the cases of Toregene and Sorqaqtani, probably the most infamous Mongol women, whose respective successful attempts to raise sons to the status of Grand Khaan ultimately dismembered the empire. But Broadbridge places those stories within the wider framework of the queens' role as the high-status women of conquered peoples, co-opted into marriage with Chinggisid princes, rather than relying on tropes of scheming women or the biased accounts of historians working for rival houses in later decades of Mongol rule.
This book is firmly feminist in its attempt to restore women to their rightful and very central role in Mongol history, but it's not a girl-power book. In her consideration of the lives of Mongol women, elite and non-elite alike, Broadbridge is clear-eyed about the harsh realities that they faced, whether as victims of war, kidnapped or captive wives, or queens who were executed for overplaying their hands (a surprising number of high-status women ended up wrapped in felt and tossed in rivers). Nevertheless, she shows us a set of systems that were distinctly different from those that prevailed in Europe at the time, and suggests the ways in which these systems regularly allowed women to wield enormous power. As she states at the end of the book, the topic of women in the Mongol Empire is a field that is in its infancy, but this book certainly provides a robust foundation for future work.
(Note that it took me over a year to finish this book only because I accidentally left it behind during what was supposed to be a short trip that the pandemic turned into a 9-month-long sojourn. The length of time doesn't reflect anything about the book; it's quite engaging.)
Addendum: On the basis of the fact that I shelved this book, Goodreads' algorithm recommended to me the following:
, which is blurbed as "...a brand new series about...wild and sexy firefighters..." I really look forward to a forthcoming book about the political role of sexy firefighters of the 13th century steppe. Meanwhile, though, thanks for the laugh, Goodreads. Sort out your algorithm.
December 8, 2021
A well-researched, well thought-through scholarly tome on elite Mongol women and their roles during the Yuan Dynasty, especially the earlier formative years. Not a book one should read before reading several good histories of the period and a more detailed study of the life of Chinggis Chan as one would get lost in the labyrinth of names and references to specific tribes and events. Nine excellent chapters covering the topics of women in steppe society, Hö'elün and Börte (the two most important women in Chinggis' life), conquered women and the important roles they could play in uniting the new tribal formations that took place post-conquests.... It was the women who not only kept the home fires burning, but literally ran and provided for the home fires (and stock and children and servants and booty) that allowed Mongol men to saddle up and become the steppe's (if not the world's) most famous warriors. The overall message is best summed up, in my opinion, from a quote from Bryn Hammond's excellent study of Chinggis Khan (Imaginary Kings): "Without your wives and your mares and your sheep... What's an army?" But if you want the specifics of who, what, when and where, this is the best reference I've found to date. Very helpful genealogical tables.
May 16, 2025
The beginning was very engaging and interesting. Once I was about 70% of the way through it was harder because I did not understand some of it and the families got more complex with names I was not familiar with.
February 7, 2025
I'm glad someone else did a book of the Mongol women of the empire. Anne Broadbridge writes her book somewhat similarly to Jack Weatherford but the added addition of being written from the female perspective and the use of multiple family trees makes the story just as interesting.
June 8, 2024
Really fascinating work. This has reminded me how much I enjoy academic writing!
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews